“独特机遇论”:中国梦乘外部优势启航

中国梦的实现需要内外部的共同合力。"独特机遇论"乘势助力中国梦的发展。中共在南方谈话中进一步明确了中国继续推进深化改革,扩大对外开放的政策。而"独特机遇论"的提出是对海外关系的正确定位和对丰富的海外资源的运用和涵养。主要包括四个方面:海外关系的开放是改革开放的首要内容,为中国的改革开放和科学发展打开了走向世界的大门,促进了"全方位、多角度、宽领域"的对外开放格局的形成,大大丰富了社会主义市场经济的内涵。在经济全球化背景下,必须坚持"以侨为本"理念,保障和涵养海外资源的可持续发展。     

Energy diplomacy under scrutiny: parliamentary control of intergovernmental agreements with third‐country suppliers

Abstract

Research on legislative?executive relations in foreign affairs has generally assumed that parliaments are more active in ‘intermestic’ affairs than in traditional foreign policy issues. This paper revisits this assumption by examining whether parliaments in European countries scrutinise crucial decisions on a typical intermestic domain: external energy policy and, more specifically, intergovernmental agreements (IGAs) on energy. Contrary to the expectation, the study finds high variation in the level of parliamentary scrutiny across and within countries. To account for this variation, the paper focuses on the role of issue framing, particularly the impact of securitising and/or depoliticising moves by members of parliament and government. The paper argues that, in contrast to traditional foreign policy matters, securitisation attempts in areas with a strong economic component are likely to increase politicisation and hence also parliamentary engagement. Conversely, parliamentary disengagement is likely to come from the opposite dynamics: successful depoliticisation of governmental responsibilities.     

Predictors of an Effective Performance Measurement System: Evidence from Municipal Governments in Turkey

The study examines the predictors of effective performance measurement in the context of Turkish municipalities. Theoretical guidance of context-design-performance model has been utilized to examine the contextual and design factors which have influenced the effective use of performance measurement systems in Turkish municipalities. It is hypothesized in the study that external support and organizational support for the use performance measurement, and technical capacity for the performance measurement are associated with quality of performance measures and effectiveness of performance measurement systems in general. The results of the study supported the hypotheses of the study regarding the relationships among organizational support, technical capacity, quality of performance measures, and effectiveness of performance measurement. Although the results confirmed that external support has an indirect effect on effectiveness of performance measurement via technical capacity and quality of performance measures, the hypothesis regarding the direct effect of it on effectiveness of performance measurement was not supported.     

Challenges for EU governance through Neighbourhood Policy and Eastern Partnership: the values/security nexus in EU–Belarus relations

Whereas the European Union (EU) has had some effect on political and economic reforms in the Ukraine and Moldova, it almost completely failed to impress the regime and population of Belarus. Despite growing consensus at the EU level that the Union's policies for Eastern Europe cannot succeed without Belarus, few attempts have been made to account for the failure of EU governance in Belarus. Having recalled the current legal and institutional set-up of EU–Belarus relations, this article introduces the notion of the ‘values/security nexus’ to explain the limited impact of EU governance in Belarus. It argues that the highly contradictory normative objectives in the Union's current Neighbourhood Policy towards Belarus effectively undermine the EU's credibility in the country: idealist values of ‘winning the hearts and minds’ of the Belarusian population increasingly collide with traditional realist goals of protecting EU interests and the stability of the Belarusian state. By way of conclusion, the article highlights the challenges facing the EU's new Eastern Partnership, including Belarus.     

Does public debt matter for human capital development? Evidence from Nigeria

An inquiry into the impact of external and domestic borrowings is considered timely for Nigeria, given the growing public debt profile amid deteriorating human capital development. Using data from 1990 to 2021, the study estimates the effects of domestic and external debts on Nigeria's human capital development. The study employed the fully modified ordinary least squares and canonical cointegration regression as the main estimation technique and the robustness check, respectively. The study discovered that domestic and external debt, economic growth and debt servicing exert positive and significant influence on human capital development in Nigeria while environmental pollution has an inverse and significant impact on human capital development in Nigeria. Premised on the outcomes, policy suggestions aimed at enhancing human capital development in Nigeria have been put forward.     

Unintended Consequences of EU External Action

ABSTRACT

There is a gap in IR and EU scholarship concerning unintended consequences in an international context, leaving this important phenomenon understudied. To fill this gap, a conceptualisation of unintended consequences is offered, and a set of common research questions are presented, highlighting the nature (what), the causes (why) and the modes of management (how) of unintended consequences of EU external action. The Special Issue contributes to the study of the EU as an international actor by broadening the notion of the EU’s impact abroad to include the unintended consequences of EU (in)actions and by shedding new light on the conceptual paradigms that explain EU external action.     

Research on the Effect and the Road of the External Incentive Factors Affecting Zheshang's Motivation of Participation in Politics——Based on the Data of the Empirical Survey in Zheshang

At present, Zhejiang merchants' political participation and enthusiasm have aroused wide attention both at home and abroad. Based on the data of the empirical survey in Zhejiang Province, this paper makes a quantitative analysis of various political participation motivation among different groups of Zhejiang merchants, and the method of statistical analysis is used to explore the external incentive factors affecting their political participation motivation. It is found that the political participation motivation of Zhejiang merchants is initially for their own enterprises' development, but later their political purpose, public welfare and social responsibility become strong and clear. Among the external incentive factors of the political participation motivation of Zhejiang merchants, the institutional encouragement affects most, followed by social encouragement and benefit encouragement. According to the characteristics of Zhejiang merchants' political participation, the following two suggestions for their orderly political participation are put forward: they should be guided to correctly treat the impacts of their gaining benefits on their political behavior and enterprise operation; the political participation mechanism of Zhejiang merchants should be improved, and the participation channel should be open with the institutional guarantee of the political participation.     

The External Dimension of EU Counter-Terrorism Relations: Competences,Interests, and Institutions

Some very significant policy developments indicate “supranationalisation processes” of EU external relations in counter-terrorism, even in its most significant relationship with the USA. This means that, increasingly, the USA is willing to work with Europe through its institutionalised forum—the European Union. Thus, the EU achieves certain recognition on the world stage in areas previously completely unsuspected—the “high politics” of counter-terrorism. This supranationalisation process proceeds in two stages. Firstly, the construction of an Area of Freedom, Security and Justice (AFSJ) pools a significant amount of national sovereignty at the level of the EU through the establishment of internal EU competences. As a side effect, however, it also constructs an institutionalised structure for external actors, such as the U.S., to deal with. Through dealing within this institutional setting, member states' interests become defined in such a way that increasingly they construct a “European” interest related to counter-terrorism.     

Turning off the Taps: The Termination of State Sponsorship

ABSTRACT

Why do some states terminate their sponsorship of rebel movements while others are persistent in their provision of support? In the past, most research on external support to insurgents has focused on why states choose to sponsor rebel groups and particularly how this affects conflict duration. However, we know little about the termination of such support. This is surprising given that support has been shown to make armed conflicts more intractable and tremendous efforts are made in condemning and sanctioning such behavior. This study constitutes the first large-N analysis of support termination, employing survival analysis on global data of state support to rebel movements between 1975–2009. Surprisingly, the findings indicate that only some of the factors that explain support provision can offer insights into its termination. In particular, support is more likely to be terminated when no ethnic kinship bonds exist between the rebel movement and the government of the supporting state. Many decisions to withdraw support also seem to coincide with the transition from the Cold War. Threats and sanctions from other states appear largely ineffective. The study contributes to our understanding of the international dimensions of civil war and the role and motives of third parties.     

Long-term monarchical survival in the Middle East: a configurational comparison, 1945–2012

The survival of eight monarchies during the “Arab Uprisings” has put centre stage the fundamental question about the durability of this subtype of authoritarian regime. Seen from a broader historical perspective, however, the idea that monarchies have an inherent advantage in retaining power is less evident: a number of authoritarian monarchies broke down and subsequently became republics (Egypt 1952, Iraq 1958, North Yemen 1962, Libya 1969, Iran 1979), while others survived (Bahrain, Jordan, Kuwait, Morocco, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates). To account for these divergent long-term pathways we systematically compare the 13 current and former Middle East monarchies. Using a fuzzy set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA), we concentrate on five central explanatory factors derived from previous research – namely, external support, rent revenues, family participation, the monarch's claim to legitimate rule, and hard repression. Our findings highlight the existence of three broad pathways to monarchical survival – linchpin monarchies, like Jordan and Morocco, versus the dynastic Gulf monarchies – and also reveal a possible hybrid third pathway, one which shares linchpin characteristics, but relates to cases on the Arabian Peninsula (Oman and the historical Imamate in North Yemen).